


For a Brief Moment

by zeromylesperhour



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: (maybe more than slightly), Abandonment Issues, Angst, Anxiety, Avocados at Law, Community: daredevilkink, Daddy Issues, Episode: s01e10 Nelson v. Murdock, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Matt just has a lot of issues, Matt's brain handles things a little too intensely, Matt's mom is kind of a jerk, Mommy Issues, OCD, Only mentioned though, Panic, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Harm, Stick is an asshole, The whole shabang, a million tags, because he's starved for affection, college/law school, dubcon, even if he doesn't like them, foggy is always a sweetheart, low key self-harm, matt is always worried about nothing, matt lets people have sex with him, nothing major, once it's mentioned he gets a little hurt during, scrupulosity, seriously google it, slightly warped sense of catholicism, sort of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-26
Updated: 2015-07-26
Packaged: 2018-04-11 07:50:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4427300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zeromylesperhour/pseuds/zeromylesperhour
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>'Maggie', he thinks. A silent mantra, and it calms his frantic thoughts, albeit slightly. </i>
</p><p> </p><p>  <i>She was lovely, his dad had said. Smart, Matt thinks, so smart. She knew what he was first. She knew he was a sin. She was so kind. Kinder than he deserved.</i></p><p>  <i>Abandoning him before he could learn to love her.</i></p><p> </p><p>For <a href="http://daredevilkink.dreamwidth.org/2760.html?thread=4493512#cmt4493512">this prompt</a> on the Kink Meme:</p><p>"Everyone leaves.</p><p>It’s a fact of life: everyone. always. leaves.</p><p>Matt’s mother left. His father died. Stick left. </p><p>So yeah, he never told Foggy about his super-sense because he knew what would happen if he did. And guess what? He was right. </p><p>Except that Foggy came back.</p><p>And now Matt doesn’t know what to do to make him stay."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You Gotta be Tough

**Author's Note:**

> Please be warned that I am not Catholic, and I know any mention or sense of Matt's Catholicism is this seems warped and probably completely wrong, which is more on purpose than anything. There's a great conversation about Matt and Scrupulosity ("...a psychological disorder characterized by pathological guilt about moral or religious issues. It is personally distressing, objectively dysfunctional, and often accompanied by significant impairment in social functioning.") at [the prompt](http://daredevilkink.dreamwidth.org/2760.html?thread=4493512#cmt4493512). 
> 
> Also Matt's mother was kind of a jerk, I understand she had her own mental challenges and postpartum depression... but still...
> 
> Super short first chapter.
> 
> This is my first fic in ages, it feels very strange.

_“For a brief moment I abandoned you,_  
_but with deep compassion I will bring you back._  
_In a surge of anger_  
_I hid my face from you for a moment,_  
_but with everlasting kindness_  
_I will have compassion on you,”_  
_says the Lord your Redeemer._  
  
_-Isaiah 54:7-8_

* * *

 

It’s the only time Matt ever sees his dad cry before the accident, and one of his earliest memories.

He remembers waking up to a strange sound, his feet finding the cold floor of their small apartment with a bit of hesitance. His subsequent walk to the kitchen is careful, his small legs unsure and unsteady, but knowing for some reason that he must be quiet.

His dad is there at the table when he peeks around the corner, holding a paper in his hand, crumpled around the edges. Matt had tried to be quiet, but he stumbles a little, and his dad always did know exactly what he was up to. You could never fool Jack Murdock.

“Matty,” his dad mumbles, less a question than a statement. There’s a sniff, and Matt is confused. It sounds like his dad’s crying, but he never cries. Matt cries all the time, about the cereal being gone, when his dad has bruises on his face, when he stubs his toe. Every time his dad pats him on his head, says to get it out, gotta move on, get back up.

His dad never cries.

“Come here, kid.”

* * *

 

_“Hey, you gotta be tough alright,” his dad told him yesterday, patting his head, but leaving him on the kitchen floor. He’d fallen trying to open the refrigerator, when the door had swung too fast, “you can sit there and cry or you can try again.”_

_His dad smiled at him from the kitchen table, “plus you look all silly when you’re crying like that. You’re gonna make me laugh!”_

_That had made Matt mad, and he’d balled up his fist and stuck his tongue out in rebuttal. His dad just laughed. He’d stopped crying._

* * *

 

His dad’s face looks kind of funny too, when he gets closer. It’s dark so he can’t really tell, but it looks like his eyes are definitely wet, and he’s beginning to feel more and more like he was right about his dad crying. It still doesn’t make sense. Why would his dad cry?

He climbs up in the chair. Crying was okay, but his dad didn’t think it was okay to pout. Matt knew that it was hard sometimes, to stop feeling sad. The paper in his hand has letters all over it, and Matt wishes he knew his letters already, that way he could understand what was the matter with his dad.

“I’m okay buddy,” his dad reassures him, grabbing his hand gently and setting the letter aside, “sorry I woke you up. Do you want a snack?”

He still doesn’t sound right, so Matt shakes his head and thinks really hard for a second. Then he squeezes his dad’s hand and pats him on the head, “you look kind of silly Daddy,” he mumbles, still sleepy.

“Yeah, I guess I do huh?”

Later, when he knows how to read and he understands more about the world, he finds the letter again. His dad has kept it, all these years, and it makes him feel like the paper is sacred, the words as important as the words in his bible. He doesn’t know if he should read it, but it’s still the only time that he’s seen his dad cry.

He wants to understand.

He’s asked his dad before, about what happened to his mom.

Your mom is gone kid. He’d say, she’s dead. I miss her, you would have loved her. She was lovely.

He sees his mom looking down on him when he goes to sleep, peering from heaven and making sure he’s okay. When he prays he sends his words to God and to his mother, hoping she’ll hear them as well.

He sees the words in the letter, and he...

He wants to understand, but he doesn’t.


	2. Smart, so Smart

“You’re gonna be fine Matty, you’re gonna be fine, everything is gonna be okay,”

With his dad’s voice and his dad’s heartbeat sounding off and rattling around in his eardrums, Matt thinks he gets for the first time why his dad so often lies.

His dad’s hands are on his arms, and his world is black, but he can _see_ so much. He senses everything around him, he doesn’t know where he is but... But it hurts. It really, really hurts.

Vaguely, he remembers the burning in his eyes, before everything went dark. This is worse. This is so much worse.

“You’re okay. Matty, Matty calm down. Hey kid, you’re gonna be fine. You’re in the hospital alright, you-- you gotta stop moving so much. Please Matty, you’re okay, you’re gonna be okay,”

His dad’s heartbeat is like thunder. He wonders if either of them even believe what he’s saying.

He feels the tears wet, wet, _wet_ on his face, and his dad’s callouses rough and hard upon his arms. More than he’s ever felt anything on his skin before. There’s so much more of everything, and yet his world is gone, his dad’s familiar face nowhere to be seen. He’s never felt this much panic, this much of anything, this much fear. He knows he’s crying, he _feels_ it.

This time, he knows his dad’s not gonna end up laughing.

* * *

 

St. Agnes is hell and Matt knows it’s because he killed his father.

The Sisters are kind but they cannot always keep him safe. The young blind boy, always confused, always paranoid, jumpy, dorky, small. What can they do?

His mind is in turmoil, his father is dead, and his senses that he had just began to get used to have become impossible to deal with. He can’t tune everything out, he has nothing to focus on. No father, no heartbeat he recognizes. Matt lies in a sea of misery and sound, and touch, and smells, and sound, and sound, and sound...

And he thinks maybe, maybe he understands the letter.

The Sisters are all confused by him. He feels the weight of their stares, their worry, not only for him, but about him. About what’s wrong with him.

What’s wrong with him?

In his dreams he sees flashes of his dad’s familiar features, hears the gunshot pierce through his eardrums with frightening clarity, sees the words of the letter swim behind his closed lids.

_‘What we did was a sin against God.’_

_‘I cannot let the Father know about Matthew.’_

_‘I have been tarnished...’_

_‘I never meant to hurt him.’_

_‘The Devil inside of you...’_

_‘Please, consider me dead.’_

He sees the split skin of his dad’s face after a fight. Sees the red of his blood before Matt stitched his wounds clean, sees it spilling onto the floor, more and more until it’s all around him. Sees himself in the mirror, his dad’s blood on his hands, his face, and he _feels_ it, and everything goes black.

He wakes up, and when his eyes open, nothing changes.

* * *

Stick is blind, but he sees potential in Matt. The Devil inside of him suddenly seems like a blessing, rather than a curse. He can get back up, like his dad taught him, he can power through. Make Stick proud. Make  _someone_ proud.

He’d disappointed his mother before he even had a chance, he’d disappointed his father, he’d disappointed the nuns at St. Agnes...

Matt gets distracted by the sound of Stick’s feet moving across the cement below them, his next hit catches Matt in the face. There is a resounding _crack_ that echoes through his brain, vibrating again and again. He feels his nose well up with blood, and spits it out when it leaks over his lips and into his mouth. His body begs him to stop, and somewhere inside of him a little boy starts crying.

Tears prick at the corner of his eyes, the wetness shocks him, and he is appalled. No one’s gonna pat him on the head, he probably looks like an idiot, and he can feel Stick’s disappointment in the air, buzzing around his head.

 _Shut the fuck up Matthew Murdock,_ he berates himself, _do you really wanna do this? Be another disappointment? Do you really wanna be wrong again?_

Somewhere inside of him, that little boy stops crying.

Matt tastes the blood on his tongue. When he tries to lash out at Stick, he gets another hit straight to his nose.

* * *

_Maggie_ , he repeats in his head, as he walks back into St. Agnes. He stumbles through the doorway, disoriented. His pulse is pounding in his head, and he can’t hear anything - except he can hear everything, and that’s the problem isn’t it? His knees are bruised from falling, from finding his way back here from an unfamiliar place, his stomach still sore from Stick’s last lesson. The last one he’ll ever get,  _Maggie_ .

The Sisters are confused and concerned, they bustle around him in a rush of noise and sound. What happened? Why are you alone? Did you walk here? Where were you? Are you okay? Matthew? Matthew. Matthew. Matthew.

_’I can’t let the Father know about Matthew. Take care of him, as best you can. God help him, and Lord forbid he follow in your footsteps._

_Please, consider me dead._

_Maggie_

He hears a kid snickering from the other side of the room, he smells the dirt on the boy’s clothes and the jam he had for breakfast. He feels the slide of a single drop of blood slowly move down his leg. He feels the nuns hands on his skin, and hears the sound of a woman cursing outside. He smells exhaust and urine and the strange scent of fear, he tastes the salt in the air and his skin feels rough, jagged, sharp. He hears the sound of Stick’s footsteps as they walk out of the room, over and over again until it's all he _can_ hear.

He doesn’t cry.

 _Maggie_ , he thinks. A silent mantra, and it calms his frantic thoughts, albeit slightly.

She was lovely, his dad had said. Smart, Matt thinks, so smart. She knew what he was first. She knew he was a sin. She was so kind. Kinder than he deserved.

Abandoning him before he could learn to love her.

* * *

When Matt dreams the people he’s never seen have faces. He hears Stick behind him and for a moment he wears his father’s face, and the next he hears him leaving, and his face looks back at him, a mix of features he barely remembers from strangers he barely glanced at. The face changes as Stick walks away, Matt doesn’t recognize any of the faces, they don’t even go together right. When he wakes up, he wishes he couldn’t remember what it was like to see. He doesn’t even feel that heartbroken, just resigned. He lays in his bed and remembers that Stick was always meant to leave him. No one would stay, not with him. He asked for too much, he was bad, he was wrong, he got what he deserved.

_Maggie_ , he insists, the familiar name calming his frayed nerves. When he smells the shit of the kid down the hall and another boy’s snoring cuts through his brain like a knife, he thinks her name again, and remembers that she was kind. More than he deserved.

He tries to imagine what she might look like, but all he sees is fire.

 _Sister Maggie_ , he thinks of the nuns in their own bedrooms, hears their hearts beating. One, Sister Patricia, walks slowly through the hallways of the building. He hears the sink turn on, and the sound of water against glass, and knows she was thirsty. He wonders if she sees him, sees him for what he is.

Maggie saw it - he does not call her mom, does not dare to - saw his sin. She saw the Devil inside of him. With Stick he thought it could be a for the best, but he should have known better. Should never have forgotten the warning in Maggie’s letter.

Matt goes to Sunday Mass, and he is silent. There are bruises on his arms from where the other boys grabbed him. He can fight back now, he can break them, hurt them, punish them for touching him. Yet he knows that he cannot. He is silent.

The words wash over him like water, cool and clean. He wishes they could cleanse his soul.

What would the Sister’s think, if they knew the Devil sat with them and heard God’s words.

Maybe if he prayed hard enough, to God, to Maggie, maybe they would strike him down. The Devil or the boy, at this point, he didn’t much care which.

 _A sin_ , her letter read, _a sin against God._

Matt goes to Sunday Mass, and he prays for absolution. There is a feeling behind his eyes that he absently recognizes as sadness. He feels as if he should cry.

 _Let it out,_ he admonishes. This makes sense, _normal kids cry._

Instead of water on his face there is blood pumping through his heart, twice as fast. He feels his fists clench. He wonders when he forgot how to cry. He wonders when he became so angry.

When Mass is over, Matt stays for hours. He prays, whispering words of praise and confession, but he cannot hear his own voice over the sound of his pulse, heavy in his ears.


	3. Sudden, Urgent

Matt turns eighteen and inherits the money his father put away for him.

Matt graduates High School with the highest honors, A’s across the board. He’d engrossed himself in schoolwork and training. He needed to be better, the best. The only thing that mattered were his grades and keeping fit and ready. His dad and Stick might be gone, but he didn’t want to disappoint them again.

The kids at school didn’t really seem to want to be his friends, and that worked perfectly fine for Matt. Maybe it was because he was blind, and they didn’t know what to say to him, how to approach him. Maybe it was because he didn’t want to make any friends either. He certainly didn’t go out of his way to talk to anyone, he had enough on his plate. Being the best was hard when your school could barely make an effort to accommodate you.

The only ones who ever tried to get close to him were of a particular variety. To them, it didn’t matter if he was cold. Matt knew the play, knew the entire script by heart after the very first time. They’d sidle into his life, their heartbeats spiking when he smiled politely. They’d whisper things in his ears, about his body, about what they’d like to do with it. No one was ever interested in what was inside.

Maybe they could see the sin, the Devil. Maybe not.

He let it happen. Let these people flit in and out of his last two years at school. He didn’t go to their parties, the music was too loud, and they smelled of vomit and piss and alcohol. They still found ways to lure him in - so they thought. He knew they found him attractive, he must have grown out of the young, gangly face he remembered. He knew his body was better, stronger - not strong enough, but strong all the same. Other times he suspected they got some strange satisfaction out of his blindness, his disability. They were giving him something, they thought, something of value. Including him, as if he couldn’t live life without their help.

It was disgusting, but he let them touch him anyway. These people he didn’t care about, at least they could get something from him. At least he could be put to good use. Do something right.

He lets these people touch him and listens to them whisper about him behind his back, like shouts in an empty room. He doesn’t care, doesn’t care at all. He just works harder.

It pays off, in the end. He feels that feeling behind his eyes again when he gets accepted to Law School, even more so when he sees the scholarship offer. Still, it’s expensive.

When he pays his first year tuition with the winnings from his dad’s fight, it feels like his dad is right there, urging him on. This is what he would have wanted, he’s finally doing something right.

That damn feeling behind his eyes won’t go away.

* * *

“Most people dance around me like I’m made of glass,” Matt admits, pleasantly surprised at his new roommates demeanor. Maybe living this close to someone won’t be total hell, “I hate that.”

“Yeah, you’re just a guy right?” Foggy replies, Matt can hear his heartbeat jump, “A really, really good-looking guy.”

“Oh,” Matt stills, and catches himself. What was he thinking? That this person he had just met, talked to for only moments... what? That they would be his friend?

He should know better.

Matt knows this play, knows the entire script by heart. He stays silent, he can’t let this one happen, because then it really will be hell living with Foggy. Hopefully he’ll let it go, move on and pursue something else once he realizes Matt isn’t even good for a conversation, let alone a sexual partner. Maybe they can live in relatively silent peace while they’re here.

Suddenly Foggy backtracks, makes some excuse about how the girls must love that. Matt is confused, obviously Foggy had thought he was uncomfortable, but why would he care. That’s not part of the script, that’s not how it usually goes.

He’s moving through the motions, a little out of his comfort zone making nice with Foggy. But the man is genuine, and sounds so happy, it’s confusing to Matt, but he finds himself answering quickly and before he can think. It’s all very unusual.

Foggy asks him if he wants to go get a coffee. _No_ , Foggy _coerces_ him into getting a coffee. There’s no semblance of choice in the way that Foggy rattles off the invitation, saying something else about picking up girls, before awkwardly offering him his arm and sweeping him out of the room. Matt barely has a chance to think before he’s sitting in the coffee shop, something warm in his hands. Normally, this should be freaking him out. He’s not okay with this, right?

Somehow, Matt doesn’t think he really minds.

He’s never liked someone so much so quickly, he tries to deny it, but even that first day he as Foggy rambles on about something, he listens closely to the breathy little laughs that escape the man every time he smiles. Like he can’t do one without the other. At the end of his story he laughs louder, a belly laugh that dances through the air and all around Matt’s head, the sound of it and Foggy’s heartbeat is loud in his heart, and something in Matt whispers, _friend_.

He has a sudden and overwhelming urge to see what Foggy looks like.

Matt hasn’t felt that way since the moment Stick walked out of his life. Couldn’t bring himself to care.

This is something new, Matt realizes. An opportunity. He shouldn’t do this, shouldn’t be so weak, but he can’t help it. He was too deep after only one conversation with the man. He feels a brief moment of hope.

Then a sudden, urgent fear.

This has barely begun, and already Matt knows he cannot stand to lose it.


	4. Thanks, for Listening

Foggy isn’t blind,

Ha.

He _sees_ Matt. Matt’s lucky he can’t see himself, or maybe Foggy wishes that he could, because then he’d see the obvious. He knows Matt doesn’t want to admit anything’s wrong, but you only need two working eyes and two minutes with Matt Murdock to see that something is a little twisted with the guy.

A few more minutes, and maybe you realize that there’s something a bit fucked up about the way Matt acts and speaks.

Now Foggy isn’t new to this. He comes from a poor family, and he’s witnessed his fair share of hardship. He knows what it looks like. It’s not like he was expecting his blinded-as-a-child-in-a-terrible-accident roommate to be the stellar picture of mental health, a charming little blueberry of fun filled excitement. He knew that Matt would probably have some issues that were holding on, and some that would never go away.

But... Well, Matt had certainly exceeded what he had been “expecting” in just about every category. He hadn’t expected someone so handsome, so stubborn, so smart, and he certainly hadn’t been expecting a best friend. So it made sense that Matt blindsided him in this category as well.

He _cared_ about Matt, _a lot_. It didn’t seem like Matt could tell, but it was true whether his new friend wanted to acknowledge it or not. And caring, well, that meant that he also worried, _a lot_.

It would be totally cool if Matt could stop saying and doing such worrying things too. Maybe go see the school counselor, or even unload some worries onto his old pal Foggy, like, literally anything other than how he currently operates and handles his day to day life. They’d only been roommates for four months and Foggy was already sure he was going to have an aneurysm.

As far as friends go, Foggy thinks that... well, they don’t really go. It basically seems to stop and start at Franklin Nelson, and sort of seems to begin and end in their dorm room. Matt spends 75% of his time studying, and when Foggy forces him out the room for some socialization, anyone would be hard pressed to get more than polite acknowledgement out of Matt. He just doesn’t seem interested in making any friends, at all, period.

It worries Foggy.

(Secretly, it also makes Foggy feel kind of special. Like he won some sweepstakes without even trying. Who gave him special permission to be the single member of the Matthew Murdock Friend Club? He’s probably never felt this lucky in his life.)

The other 25% of Matt’s life is a goddamn mystery. Oftentimes he just wanders away, mumbling some random excuse as to where he’s off to. Foggy has to work really hard to stave off his rampant protective instincts and let the man have some space, but he can’t help but to worry he’s going to get lost or walk face first into a wall the entire time he’s gone.

Ask Matt a question about his personal life, about how he’s feeling, chances are you’re gonna get some unintelligent gibberish, or an answer that haunts your soul for a week or two. Foggy knows he shouldn’t prefer the former, but sometimes the latter stresses him out just a bit too much.

“Your dad was awesome,” Foggy ventures one day, after watching youtube videos of Battlin’ Jack Murdock rather guiltily with his headphones in. He’s curious, and it’s true, and he thinks that maybe he can get Matt to share a little bit. Even a little is better than nothing.

Matt goes still, which is a bad start, but then a small smile pulls over his face. “Yeah, he was,” he starts, actually sounding excited.

To Foggy’s surprise, Matt launches into a chain of stories about his dad. The pride in his voice overflowing, and Foggy has to contain his own smile, even though he knows Matt can’t see it. There’s some worrying stuff in there too, mixed with the good stuff, but it all seems to be good to Matt so Foggy tries not to dwell. The idea of his father coming home and having him take a swig of his drink so he’ll have steady hands while he stitches his face is... something he’s having trouble not dwelling on but...

Matt suddenly becomes quiet, so quickly that Foggy is shocked. He’d been talking about his dad taking him to the gym while he trained, how he always wanted him to study - and maybe that explains the obsessive drive he has with his schoolwork, this studying thing came up in pretty much every story he had told. Foggy hadn’t thought he had said anything that sounded bad at all, but Matt suddenly looked really distressed in that way he looked when he was trying very hard _not_ to look distressed.

“Then he died, you know, it was in the papers,” Matt summarizes quickly, and Foggy thinks he’s probably lost him. Expects the next response to be nothing more than a mumble before his friend hides away. He’s happy though, it’s the most he’s gotten out of Matt yet.

“What about your mom? Did you go live with her after?” Foggy wonders. He’s never heard Matt talk about his mom yet, he might have mentioned her once. He thought maybe his parents had divorced when he was very young.

A strange smile worked its way over his friend’s features, and Foggy felt those weird little warning bells go off in his head. He had never had these bells before, they had appeared when Matt did, and more and more of them kept popping up all the time, “Maggie” he sighs,”I’ve never met her, she’s gone.”

He says it wistfully, strangely, as if he’s happy about it.

Foggy is a little uneasy, “I’m sorry,” he genuinely is, although he can’t tell if Matt would want him to be. Probably not. “Is she dead?”

“Nah,” Matt’s smile gets a little more... real? “Just smart.”

Abruptly, Foggy wishes he had never asked. He’s torn between asking what the _hell_ Matt means by that, and never touching on that response ever.

“Matt...” he’s out of his depth, he usually is with Matt, “I really love that you’ve shared all this with me man, like hell yes I’m glad you’ve told me all these awesome stories but... What the heck does that mean?”

“Nothing,” Matt’s smile vanishes even quicker than it appeared, and he turns in his bed so that his face is pressed into his pillow, “she’s just... Just smart. I just gotta...” The rest is muffled by the pillow.

Foggy wishes those stupid bells would shut up.

“Thanks,” Matt says, a little louder, “for listening.”

_Baby steps_ , Foggy thinks, _right?_

* * *

In their second year, Matt comes in their room with a bruise on his face and a strange expression. Foggy had left him earlier when Matt had sheepishly found him at the bar and informed him that he’d found someone he was gonna go home with. Honestly, Foggy was - totally not jealous at all, absolutely not jealous why would he be? - really excited for Matt. Apparently he had made some sort of genuine connection, something that Foggy was beginning to worry he wasn’t ever going to make. It might change their dynamic, but Foggy was totally willing to slip someone else into their life easy as pie, if it meant Matt would have someone else he could talk to.

Apparently... not?

“Dude, what happened?” Foggy asked, rising from his his bed and almost dropping his laptop on the floor in his haste, “are you alright? You look...”

Matt’s eyes are hidden behind his glasses, but Foggy can he his eyebrows scrunch up in confusion, knows his best friend well enough to perfectly imagine what those eyes must look like.

“What do you mean?” Matt asks, “I’m fine, great actually,”

He doesn’t look great, he doesn’t even look fine. “Okay. Good, I’m glad you’re great.” Foggy’s not sure what to do with himself now, halfway between worried fawning and retreating to his bed, “so... Details then! What happened? Who is this allusive stranger who wooed Matty Murdock, the Ice King of Columbia?”

His friend shucks off his jacket and sits on his bed, “Oh,” he pauses for a second, before shrugging at Foggy, “I don’t know. It was fine, I mean, I don’t really remember their name. I can’t tell you what they looked like obviously and details... I don’t know I just sorta... You know.” He waved his hand through the air, in the general direction of his face, “and I am not an Ice King.”

Foggy was quiet for a whole minute. He knew the archetype of the “hot guy”, the one who had anonymous one night stands and objectified women, and Matt certainly fit that physically. Mentally, though, that didn’t really seem to be Matt’s thing, mostly it seemed like he didn’t really have time for that kind of stuff, and Foggy had seen Matt let anyone flirt with him, regardless of gender. This type of nameless sex wasn’t really something that he thought Matt would partake in, then again, it wasn’t like Matt really got anybody’s name. Still...

_I don’t know I just sorta... You know._

Foggy frowns, does he know? He thinks he might, the way Matt gestured like that. The last time Matt talked about something like that, they were in a really loud shop trying to buy some bread, and he just sort of checked out, left for a little bit until they were done and Foggy led them back to campus. When he had asked if he was okay, Matt had said almost the same thing. If that’s what Matt means though...

This feeling of nervous confusion shouldn’t seem so normal to him, but at this point, it does.

He purposefully walks over and beside Matt where he is lying on his bed, absently running his hands over the Braille of his textbook. Matt doesn’t look up or question him, maybe it’s because he knows what’s coming.

“Matt? Hey, man, be honest okay,” he nudges at the book with his hand, and Matt reluctantly moves his head in Foggy’s general direction, “cool, now that I’ve got your attention. What do you mean? You gotta tell me if anybody... Made you do anything you didn’t want to... Or...”

“No! Foggy! No, it wasn’t like that! Nobody fucking _raped_ me,” Matt hissed, “I met them and I went home with them and it was consensual, what the hell?”

“Hey! Sorry, you just... Talked like you do when you like, are out of it for a while, and you’ve got this,” he pokes Matt’s face, and his friend winces, “which is new and incredibly suspicious.”

“It was as good as it ever is Foggy,” Matt hisses, he might be blushing, Foggy isn’t sure, “which is to say it was fine. Why are you asking me so many questions?”

“You know sex is supposed to be fun, right?”

Matt doesn’t answer, moving his head pointedly back in the direction of his book, and sealing his mouth shut. He looked like he might be grinding his teeth, so Foggy tried to suppress the worry in his heart and get up from his friend’s bed. Maybe this is just another one of Matt’s weird social things, hopefully it isn’t something more.

Hopefully.

Foggy makes sure to ask for their names every time Matt comes back. Eventually, he has to start communicating with people, at least if it means he doesn’t have to deal with Foggy’s questions, right?

* * *

Their last year Matt is pensive and quiet for an entire month. Foggy doesn’t ask, knows his friend needs space - a lot of space, but when Matt has been brooding for more than three weeks he knows something has to happen. Intervention? The thought makes him laugh.

Sometimes, he knows, the best way to solve sadness is to pretend it isn’t there. This is something he has always excelled at: deflecting! His ceaselessly cheery disposition and charming attitude helps too of course, Matt’s lucky he got stuck with a happy-go-lucky dude like him.

They’re eating lunch when he makes his move. They had only spoken of the future with idyllic awe and vague, sweeping statements. Matt didn’t seem too keen to even discuss graduation, so Foggy kept it broad. Helping people, lawyering things, lawyering at things, ya know, being the best damn avocados in general (at law). So he had no idea how Matt would take this.

“So I was thinking...” he starts, waving his straw through the air and probably getting Sprite all over Matt’s face, “about what we’re doing after we graduate.”

Well, he certainly didn’t expect Matt to immediately do that go-still-and-shut-down-my-entire-expression thing he does. Foggy thought he should probably at least have the decency to listen to what he was going to propose before deciding he didn’t want to hear it.

“That’s a while away Foggy I think-“

“Nah, it’s really not dude. I know you’re all wrapped up in your studies all the time and forget what day or month it is but it’s happening really soon, and we need to figure out what we’re gonna do.”

Matt is silent. He looks like he might break the plastic glass that his hand is wrapped around. Foggy takes it from him and moves it to the other side of the table, just in case. He also doesn’t ask, _pick your battles_ , he thinks, _one thing at a time_.

“So let’s talk about it!” He tries to sound excited, because he is, but Matt’s attitude is kinda messing with his mojo, “What do you think about-“

“There’s nothing to talk about,” Matt frowns, and yeah, it’d be really cool if he could stop interrupting Foggy and let him get to the point. But, whatever, “school ends and we leave right? You go do whatever you wanna do, I go off and do my thing, I get a Christmas card from your mom once in a while. That’s how this works, right?”

Oh... Okay. Foggy tried not to be super offended and upset by Matt wanting to ditch him right after school - he thought they were friend, best friends - because it sounds kind of like Matt’s pretending to sound angry. Foggy has heard Matt angry, and this isn’t quite that.

“You... Don’t wanna be friends after school?” Foggy asks gently, attempting not to let any actual emotion flavor that question. He thinks he probably fails, judging by the lump in his throat.

Matt looks like he doesn’t know what to say, he moves back in his seat and pushes and hand underneath his glasses to rub at the bridge of his nose, “What?” He mumbles, mostly to himself.

Foggy tries a new angle, “You don’t think _I_ wanna be your friend after school ends?”

Matt stills and looks away, hiding his face. Foggy thinks he looks a little bit like he’s being tortured. He’s had a lot of weird conversations with Matt, he thinks this might be the strangest. He’s definitely hit the nail on the head, not that the idea makes much sense. Why would he think...?

“Matt, I was gonna ask you if you wanted to-- Look, I’m applying for an internship at Landman and Zack, and wanted to know if you wanted to apply too. I hadn’t even thought about splitting up. I kind of always figured we were gonna work together,” Foggy sighed, tapping the back of his friend’s hand with his pointer finger, “if you’ll have me. You’re my best friend Matt, I don’t want to stop being your friend. Why would you eve-- no, just, okay? What do you say?”

There’s another moment of silence between them, Matt doesn’t move or say a word, and Foggy wonders if maybe he misinterpreted this entire thing. Maybe Matt had never really connected with him the way he thought they had... Maybe he really didn’t want Foggy around, dragging him down. Not when he had so much potential and-

Matt turns his face back to Foggy, his smile so huge and real that it completely short-circuits Foggy’s brain. He grabs his hand, and Foggy’s entire train of thought crumbles into dust. Matt looked... _happy_ , in a way that he hadn’t before. Foggy wondered why in the world something so small could make him feel like he kind of wanted to cry.

“You’re my best friend,” Matt face becomes serious, and he says it with so much conviction that it sounds like a prayer, “Foggy. You’re my best friend too.”

Foggy thinks he chokes a little, but he gets the words out eventually, “does that mean you’re gonna apply too.”

“Yeah,” Matt sighs, and goes back to eating.

He smiles through their entire meal and all the way through their next class.


End file.
